Virgin Media Cable Advert

dirtychinchilla

dirtychinchilla

dirtychinchilla

Soldato
Joined
2 May 2011
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Location
Woking
So has anyone seen this advert:


I'm a bit perplexed as to what anyone would think this adds to the quality of their connection. Firstly, if people think Virgin Media are good, then they're utterly wrong. Secondly, if the cable from one cable to the other is faster, all you'll get is faster transfer between those two cables, not faster transfer from the (probably not working because it's Virgin Media) exchange, ie it basically does nothing...

Am I oversimplifying things?

I really hate misleading advertising, so this wound me up.

Bear is cool btw.
 
I was thinking the same when I saw it - Just a tosh advert to try and win people with no tech knowledge at all in an underhand way.

I am suprised the ASA have allowed it tbh as it is very misleading.
 
On the plus side they aren't calling it fibre optic any more.

It should be the easiest thing in the world for the ASA/Ofcom to go "lol nope" at the ISPs calling VDSL fibre, but they'd rather just sit down in a chair I guess.
 
I have FTTC and only a 100m copper line between my house and the cabinet. So this new copper tech would only benefit me for those 100m and as I'm getting 75up/19down I honestly can't see it making much if any difference.

Just a ploy to grab gullible customers.
 
It's not quite the same when you mention it's pretty much the same cable as the ariel you've plugged into the back of your TV for pretty much forever.
 
so its the same coax cable they have been using for the past 20 years !

woot

Better than calling it all "fiber optic" like their call center clowns.
One guy insisted that if i upgrade to 100mbit ( a while back now) id get fibrecore into my old London house. I asked him to clarify it 3 times, then clarify it with his supervisor after.... What a surprise he didn't have a clue what he was on about.. :P
I was really bored that day... :(
 
I work in the industry for a supplier to virgin's parent company (and many other Telco's) and I was rather surprised at the advert. DOCSIS 3 is a technical standard, but you are talking about something so incredibly boring than if I start talking about it to other nerds outside of Telco's their eyes glaze over and they suddenly need to be somewhere else.

Most people don't know and don't care about whether coax cable can give you better speeds than traditional twisted copper pair. In practise it comes down to price and what can you actually get where you live. Strangely BT seem to have a lot more offers available to those of us who live in VM cable areas ! I get junk mail from them weekly.

VM are really good where I live. I've been a customer for nearly 15 years now. From other posts I've seen, the main issues seem to be areas where they have too many customers in a small area and never had the money to upgrade the cabinets. Being bought by liberty global a while back should improve that.

Just as you should never let marketing people near technology, the opposite also applies.
 
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I quite like VM broadband, consistently get 162Mbps through the line and has been pretty reliable.

As for the cables, I thought it was fibre optic that runs under the roads to the cabinets, then coax running from the cabinets to the properties? I am probably wrong though.
 
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slick rick said:
As for the cables, I though it was fibre optic that runs under the roads to the cabinets, then coax running from the cabinets to the properties? I am probably wrong though.
Click to expand...

Yes it is for BT. Not sure about VM, always thought that was fibre to the premises. :confused:
 
VM were always great for me in Leeds and consistently faster than ADSL solutions. I don't think it's totally misleading, especially if you're in an area where Openreach haven't done FTTC in which case I'd certainly take VM over any ADSL.
 
It's a cheap marketing gimick aimed at people that haven't much of a clue.

My gripe is the use of the word DOCSIS 3, this has nothing to do with the physical cable, it's merely a protocol.

It's funny but I can imagine this advertising probably works on most of the population that don't know. Especially the part of the ad where a side by side shot of a twisted pair copper cable which BT and coaxial cable, throw in DOCSIS 3 and boom.. Mind is blown by many. Therefore it must be better?!

As a side note, I've been a Virgin media customer for 11 years now. I have no real major problems with them at all. They were over subscribing in the area a few years back but they have been fine since they've increased local network capacity.
 
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stopper said:
Bit of a bold statement to say you haven't experienced VM in every corner of the country.
Try BT in my area then tell me VM are rubbish.
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Indeed. My experience is that both BT (and the companies they lease too) and Virgin are all awful when there are problems (customer service, response time etc) . However, I pay less and get a faster connection with Virgin than I would with BT. Shinest of the two turds.
 
slick rick said:
I quite like VM broadband, consistently get 162Mbps through the line and has been pretty reliable.

As for the cables, I thought it was fibre optic that runs under the roads to the cabinets, then coax running from the cabinets to the properties? I am probably wrong though.
Click to expand...

That's right. The parents have been using cable since Nynex dug up the town in the very early 90s, and it's always been served down the same bit of coax under the drive, be it analogue or the newer digital services.

Sliver said:
Yes it is for BT. Not sure about VM, always thought that was fibre to the premises. :confused:
Click to expand...

Nope. Fibre to the local node, then coax from there to the customer premises. BT Infinity was about 15 years late to that party!
 
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